B&W

Never before have I seen collected photographers tackle anything with so much gusto and motivation.

The ‘5 Day Black and White Challenge’ based on Facebook seems to have galvanised Australia’s media photographers past and present. The quality of black and white images that have been gracing Facebook over the last few weeks have been sensational. The challenge has meant that many fine images taken over the decades are getting another well deserved airing instead of wallowing in the archives. Some real gems have appeared.

The list of Australian and Australian based photographers that have become involved is enormous. It’s a veritable ‘who’s who’ of Australian media photographers through the decades. Click on each of the photographers links below and it will take you to the great work in their particular B&W challenge.

So … in no particular order (and apologising for those I havn’t found) … David Dare Parker, Tim Page, Polani Mohan, Nick Moir, Dean Lewis, Brett Faulkner, Phil Hillyard, Tim Clayton, Mike Larder, Richard ‘Tommy’ Campion, Juno Gemes, Craig Greenhill, Rick Stevens, Graham Crouch, Megan Lewis, Glenn Campbell, Craig Golding, Tamara Dean, George Fetting, David May, Steve Holland, John French, Andy Zakeli, Mark ‘Crusty’ Baker, Steve Christo, Leigh Henningham, Martine Perret, Adam Hollingworth, Grant Turner, John Feder, Heather Faulkner, Verity Chambers, Jay Town, Gregg Porteous, Brett Costello, Nadia Janis, Jeff Darmanin, Chris Hyde, Jake Nowakowski, Richard Wainwright, Michael Amendolia, Hamish Blair, Jack Atley, David Maurice Smith, Russell Shakespeare, James Brickwood, Craig Sillitoe, David Geraghty, Peter Bull, Dave Tacon, Matthew Goddard Jones, Sean Davey, Roger Garwood, Delly Carr, Cameron Spencer, Wolter Peeters, Natalie Grono, Sam Harris, Vince Caligiuri, Ryan Pierse, Luke Marsden, Mark Dadswell, Asanka Brendon Ratnayake, Alan Pryke, Kelly Barnes, David John Teas E, Conor Ashleigh, Adam Knott, Meredith O’Shea,  AJ Moran, Nathan Edwards, Lindsay Moller, Morne Saffieboy de Klerk, James Elsby, David Mariuz, Quentin Jones, Alex Coppel, Craig Borrow, Peter Solness, Gary Ramage, Andrew Quilty … the list appears endless …

It doesn’t stop there either … around the World there are many thousands of photographers taking the opportunity to file some BW’s and ‘dob in’ another five colleagues. Photographers of the highest profile such as USA’s Ben Lowy have joined in.

My challenge was made by my Darwin mate Glenn Campbell. Over the five days I’ve nominated Dean Lewins, Craig Greenhill, Richard Wainwright, Sam Mooy and Tracey Nearmy.

The five B&W’s I selected for my challenge are below and if you click on the images it will take you to the relevant Facebook pages where you will see all the details, comments and ‘likes’. From top we have ‘Dire Straits’, ‘Polite Lawn Bowls’, ‘Race Fall’, ‘Fiji Coup’ and ‘Huli Woman’ and the images were made between the 80’s and 2000, all but number 4 on film (more than likely on Nikon FM2 or F4 bodies) whilst ‘Fuji Coup” was made on a Nikon D1 digital.

You can see many other photographers 5 Day B&W challenges by visiting #fivedayblackandwhitechallenge

Images © Brian Cassey